Waiting for the Music to Begin
by crookedview
Summary: When they were rescued, Kate told Jack to never come near her again. The fear was too real. But life without Jack was life without breathing. And Kate was suffocating.
1. Epiphany

**A/N Hey everyone! If I owned any aspects of Lost, I wouldn't be writing about it. I'd be hanging out with Josh Holloway. And this first chapter is actually a chapter from one of my other fics, "Troubled Water". For those that read it, bless your little hearts, and please be patient. I'm building this story from that chapter. A REAL new chapter is coming soon! Please read and review! Any criticism (or confessions of undying love) are welcome!**

Her two roommates Laura and Angel watched the newcomer. When the guard brought her into the cell for the first time, they looked up from their poker game with interest. They had heard about this new one.

They were disappointed. She was ashen-faced, and her thin lips were pressed together gravely. There was an odd blankness in her eyes. She was unhealthily skinny, her posture was bent like an old woman's as if she was ashamed and was trying not to be seen. Her hair was long and curly and looked unattended to. As soon as the barred cell door closed, she gravitated to the bare bed and lay down without a word.

For a long time, they asked her questions politely. They asked the obligatory one – "What are _you _in for?" She did not answer. They changed subjects. They asked about the plane crash, the island. When she still didn't speak, they asked other things, like if she had a boyfriend. After a few weeks of trying, they gave up. They realized that she wouldn't speak to anyone.

They had concernedly told some of the staff about her. They said she might want a shrink or an antidepressant or something. There was something wrong with her. But nothing could be done, because she refused to take any medicine and she refused to speak.

They kept a close eye on her. She was a mystery, and they were curious. She lay in bed, curled up in a ball, face turned away from searching eyes. Her thin, coarse blanket was wrapped around her at all times, even when she left the cell to eat, which was seldom. As weeks went by, they sometimes forgot she was there. That lump on the bed in the corner, that enigma meant nothing to them, because they didn't know her, and doubted they ever would. So they watched her remain silent and watched her slowly lose weight and watched her fade away. In more than four months, Katherine Ryan hadn't cracked a smile, hadn't shared her story, hadn't spoken a word to anyone.

So her roommates were surprised when they came back from lunch to see her sitting at the table, holding a newspaper in two shaking hands, and laughing.

The guard who was escorting them gave her a strange look, but continued on his way after he carefully locked the cell door.

There she was, sitting straight, her face with the first signs of emotion her roommates had ever seen… and it scared them. She was shaking severely, the newspaper quivering, and there were tears in her eyes. Her laughter was raucous and out of control. She was gasping for breath, but she still laughed.

They stood in front of her, afraid to say anything, or go near her. She turned to them, and her laughter died down. She still held an insane smile on her face. Slowly, she turned the paper so it faced them.

"I found this in a trash can in the hall." She said loudly, mirth in her raspy voice. "Apparently, they don't clean out the garbage very often." She looked at them, and they stared back. "Well, come on, look at it. It's funny."

Cautiously, Laura and Angel stepped forward, eyeing her as if she was insane. She probably was. She had an odd gleam in her eyes, and her mouth was still curled in that unkind smirk. Her cheeks were very flushed, no longer the unhealthy gray pallor that they had been all these weeks.

They leaned forward and looked at the paper. On the front page was the large headline "Castaways Presumed Dead are Rescued". Next to it was a picture of a thirty-ish man with short dark hair and a tattoo on his arm. He was smiling, but it was a fake, hollow smile. The caption read, "Jack Shepherd, a surgeon, may have saved several lives after the Oceanic 815 crashed."

She chuckled again, alarming her roommates. They involuntarily stepped backwards.

"Everyone who I ever cared about," she rasped, looking directly at them, "has either left me or died." She flung the paper across the room suddenly, as if she couldn't bear to touch it any longer. It hit the wall and fluttered to the cold linoleum floor. "Except for them. And he won't come and visit. I'll rot away in prison before any of them come." Her voice escalated angrily as she continued, but she still smiled.

"Why?" Laura asked timidly. It was whispered, it was afraid.

She stopped smiling abruptly. "I told him not to. I told Jack to tell everyone that I never wanted to see any of them again." She looked at them, searching for understanding. When they didn't reply, she said, "I didn't want them to see me like… like _this._" She spread her pencil-thin arms wide, gesturing her fallen state. "I'm pathetic! I'm weak and selfish and disgusting!" Her cheeks flushed even more. "I don't even recognize myself anymore! I used to be able to handle-" She suddenly coughed, a deep long cough that rattled against her protruding ribs. A flash of pain crossed her face. She stopped, and took a big, gasping breath. She sat in the middle of the room looking like a miserable child.

Finally, Laura reached out tentatively to comfort her. "Katherine…"

She pulled back jerkily. "Kate."

"Kate." She lightly touched Kate's shoulder, and this time she didn't flinch. "God," Laura breathed. "You're burning up!"

Kate ignored her. "I have lived a life that has just ruined everyone else's. I have made everyone who knows me wish they didn't." She looked shocked to say this out loud. Kate coughed again, and this one was worse. She doubled over, choking. When it finally subsided, she had tears dripping out of her eyes. "Why am I telling you this?" she said, suddenly agitated. "I don't know you. I don't know you! You don't give a damn!" Her shaking frame stood up, kicking the wooden chair out of the way. It tipped and crashed to the floor with a loud echoing boom.

She gave a final shudder and passed out cold on the floor.

She dreamed of when the cargo ship came upon their island. It was an accident, they had said, they had veered offcourse during a storm. Everyone was jubilant, all smiles and hugs and laughter. They had all piled onto the boat without a backward glance at the island. Well, not all of them. Shannon looked utterly miserable to leave. So did Hurley. And Kate… she had stood at the line where the beach ended and the forest began, and had seriously considered simply running into the forest, running as far as she could and staying where she was until they left. But anything would be better than that, right? Not so, she thought, even as she dreamed.

So she had gotten onto the boat, and once they reached California had climbed down the gangplank, seeing as she walked, a group of police officers and knowing there would be no escape. As they handcuffed her, Jack had come up to her side, with concern and even a bit of fear in his expression. Kate had turned a cold face to him.

"I don't ever want to see you again." She spat at him. "I don't want to see any of you ever. Keep out of my fucking life." She had spoken with such vehemence that she had thought Jack would have looked angry or hurt. But his face just closed. She realized that he had expected this from her, and the realization made her even more furious.

"Okay, Kate." Softly, resignedly. That was all he said. Then he looked at her a final time, melted back into the crowd, and she was towed away with everyone staring at her.

So often had she replayed this in her mind behind her closed eyes. She hated it, hated her life, hated herself. Kate had lost all hope and desire. What was the point of going outside if it was cold and artificial everywhere except in the dark under her blanket where no one could see her? What was the point of eating if it all tasted like ash in her mouth? What was the point of talking to all these women? They didn't understand her and she didn't understand them. The only thing they had in common was that they were all horrible people.

The first thing she noticed when she woke up was that she was hot. She felt very hot, ached all over and she was not in her jail cell bed. When she opened her eyes, everything was a blurred mess. Most of the blur was white. Was she in a hospital? She tried to remember the last thing that had happened. She was acting like a lunatic in the cell. She was screaming at her roommates. She knocked the chair over…

"Kate!"

Hearing her name, she jolted up, which she immediately felt sorry that she had done. Her head throbbed, and she was very dizzy. Her wrist scraped against metal and stung painfully… was she cuffed to the bed?

"Here, lay back down." Two strong hands gently pushed her back against the pillows. She blinked several times to clear her vision as well as her brain. She gave a weak gasp.

Jack was standing over her, his hands on her shoulders.

She didn't know what to feel. First she was surprised, and then her surprise turned to anger, then melted away to complete happiness.

"Jack." Was all she could manage to say, as she looked dazedly up at him.

He grinned. "Hi."

She was starting to feel cold again. She started shivering under her sheets. "I don't understand what's going on." She said pitifully, her voice still raspy from disuse.

"You're very sick." He told her seriously. "You almost died. Kate, you haven't been eating." He sounded very paternal and stern. It might have annoyed her before, but now she was just so pleased to hear his voice that she didn't mind.

But she suddenly felt very self-conscious about her thin body.

"I know." She felt a chill go through her body. "But why're you here?" She slurred, unable to speak clearly, especially through her suddenly chattering teeth.

"They're letting me stay with you for a while under the circumstances." Still under her confused stare, he continued. "Your roommate was able to get some help finding me." He paused. "I'm sorry."

She wasn't sure whether he was sorry for her being sick, or sorry he had gone against her wishes or sorry that he had come. She didn't have enough energy to ask.

She saw him look at her exhausted, fevered self, and she watched as he sat down on the edge of the bed.

"You're cold?" He asked quietly.

She nodded.

Slowly, gently, he lay down next to her and wrapped his arms around her. Her head lay against his warm and protective chest, and her held her tightly. She closed her eyes.

"I missed you so much." She whispered.

And he held her for a long time, until her violent shivering subsided and she fell into a deep and untroubled sleep.


	2. Long Lost, but not Forgotten

**A/N Hello, my dear Losties! SHOCKING episode a few days ago! Oh dear. I hate it when they kill anybody, but... sob. And poor Sawyer. :( Anyways. Here is chapter 2. Just so you know, now that both Kate and Jack have had a perspective, my chapters will be shorter. Just so I can have the chapters to be more managable and get these updates to you! I'm a busy, busy girl! But enough of this banter, read my chappie, and get to reviewing! (Please!) XD Love, crookedview**

They had reported it to the newspapers, the anchors and the reporters, and anyone else who asked – it had been an accident. It wasn't a rescue boat, instead, a small cruise line. There had been no passengers on board at the time, just the crew taking the ship back to port. They hadn't meant to come across a small civilization of people who had been assumed dead for eight and a half months. Oh no, it had been a lucky accident; a very lucky accident.

"Except for that convict, huh?" one crew member chucked during an interview with Fox news.

"I guess it wasn't so lucky for her. Probably a little disappointed we showed up, poor thing." He grinned charmingly at the camera.

The interviewing anchor couldn't help but be a bit disgusted. This guy was one of the most insincere people she had ever met. He didn't seem to think that Katherine Austin was a 'poor thing' at all.

Of course, not many people who were following the news reports of the lost airplane _did_ pity her. After all, she'd tried to kill her whole family, right?

* * *

Jack called in sick from work the next day, which he thought was somewhat ironic, seeing as he would still be spending the majority of his day at St. Sebastian's Hospital, making his routine commute into the building he worked six days of the week.

On the drive there, groggily clutching a cup of coffee, he tried to sort out everything that had happened. The shock of seeing Kate again, when he had told himself that he never would, was still electrifying. He had not been prepared to see her so… transformed. Maybe he hadn't been ready to see her at all, after her frigid final words to him. Jack couldn't say that he hadn't expected her to have acted that way, but it still stung him. He had tried to reason with himself; Kate had finally been caught like a hunted animal, so of course she lashed out like she did. But he couldn't help but harbor some resentment.

Not that he hadn't missed her either. On the island, they had… they had fallen in love, Jack guessed, though it sounded corny even in his thoughts. They had been together all the time. When they were rescued, it was like being slapped in the face. One minute, they were standing next to each other on that damn cruise ship that 'saved' them, and the next, she was being shoved out of sight into a squad car. And that was the end of it, he had thought.

Suddenly she wasn't there any more; she'd vanished into thin air. Jack had reunited with his mother and his friends. He'd even had his position given back and returned to work. Everything was the same as before. Except that he couldn't forget Kate.

He had worried about her constantly. It took all of his will power to stay where he was and not drive down to the women's correctional facility. A mere hour away…

_But for once,_ he had thought, _I'm not going to meddle in places I'm not wanted. For once. Let it go. It's what she wants. _And he had tried.

If only he'd known that Kate was letting herself die and it was his fault.

He arrived at Kate's room at 7:30. Nodding slightly at the thuggish security guard stationed outside her door, he let himself in. (The guard had been warned crudely that Katherine Austin was an experienced escapist, anorexic or not.)

The room was dark, the musty curtains drawn tightly. Jack could see that Kate was still asleep. From the looks of her, though, she had gotten as much of a good sleep as he had. The sheets had been pulled out from underneath the mattress and were wrapped around her like a straitjacket, twisted into a heap, showing that she had been thrashing around for a good part of the night. The arm that was not handcuffed was thrown across her face, obscuring her closed, fevered eyes.

Jack watched her motionless form and sank unto the lumpy armchair next to the bed. Even in her sleep, Kate looked distressed. He stared dolefully at her, his Kate that had changed so much. In two short months, she had become deeply depressed and secluded, her roommate had told him. She spent day after day curled up on her bed. She would only eat every so often, and pick at her food when she did. She wouldn't take anti-depressants. She wouldn't talk to anyone.

"Anyone?" Jack had asked Laura Hoffman incredulously over the pay phone in the hospital lobby.

"Nope." She'd said simply.

Would she have talked if he'd visited? Or would she have ignored him too, pretended he didn't exist?

"I think she just gave up." Kate's roommate continued.

"Gave up on what?" he had asked her. It was as if he could see her shrug over the phone.

"Everything."

Rubbing his shadowed eyes, Jack inhaled deeply. He was here now, he kept telling himself. And she hadn't pushed him away yesterday. _Even though, _he thought dryly, _she may feel differently when her temperature is about eight degrees lower._

As if Kate had heard his thoughts in her own troubled sleep, she stirred. Dragging her arm across her face, she opened her eyes. She blinked several times, and then glanced down at her handcuffed wrist. She looked surprised but Jack couldn't tell if it was because she had forgotten why the cuff was on her or because of the ugly ring of bruises where the metal had left its mark. She gazed down at her hand for a moment. Then she seemed to notice that she wasn't alone in the room, and her head snapped around to face Jack.

"Sorry." Jack said hastily. "I didn't mean…"

"It's okay." She assured him. Her voice was quiet and almost too calm. She tried to sit up propping herself up on her elbows, but it was obvious from the strained look on her face, and her wobbling arms that she was finding it hard to do so. Jack quickly leaned over to move the pillows and guide her into an upright position.

Kate looked embarrassed to be so weak, but didn't say anything. She looked weary; her head back against the flattened pillows, strands of hair lay limply across her face. She impatiently brushed them away.

"I'm afraid I haven't dressed to entertain today." She said wryly, making an effort to smile. Instead, her eyes began to glitter dangerously with tears. She turned her head quickly.

"How are you doing, Kate?" Jack asked gently.

She rubbed an arm unceremoniously across her face. After a moment, she finally looked at him, her expression determinedly blank.

"I don't really know." She set her jaw and furrowed her eyebrows slightly, as if she was trying to remember something. "It's weird to be here, with you." She paused and drew a shaky breath. "I thought I'd scared you off for good." Her gaze flickered, and she looked down at her lap.

Jack leaned back in his chair, unsure of how to answer. _So did I_ didn't seem like the proper response. But she saved him from any awkward answer he might have given out.

"I'm glad you came. Even thought… even though…" She trailed off, clasping her hands nervously. Her knuckles went white. Jack didn't say anything; he could tell Kate was trying to muster up the courage to say something important.

Just when she finally opened her mouth to speak, the door was thrown open, and a jolly voice boomed, "Good mooooorning!" A man in an enormous white lab coat bustled into the room. It was enormous because so was he. He also had a huge, distracting rusty-looking moustache that partially obscured his upper lip, and matching hair that flopped around on his face as he walked. His eyebrows were high, giving him a permanently surprised expression.

"And how are we today?" He looked around comically, exaggerating each motion. His hair flopped and his chin wobbled. "Ah, you're already awake! And with a visitor! Wonderful, wonderful."

Jack couldn't help but want to laugh at this absurd man, even if he didn't interrupt whatever Kate was about to say. He gave her an apologetic smile, then stood and introduced himself. He knew many doctors that worked in the hospital, but this one was not familiar.

"Dr. Everett Pinkham!" the robust doctor nearly shouted. "Nutritionist!" He grabbed Jack's hand and shook it vigorously, then turned to Kate, who was looking vexed. "And you're Katherine." He said, as if giving her a valuable piece of information.

Kate didn't say anything. In fact, as Jack watched, she seemed to shrink a little. Her expression faded slowly, so there was soon only a small frown on her face. Her eyes even glazed over a little, as if she was uninterested in anything going on. Jack imagined little warning alarms going off in his head. Was this what she did to everyone else; retreat inside herself and ignore them until they left her alone?

There was a long beat, as Kate stared blankly ahead of her, and Pinkham looked awkward. "Katherine?" He waited again for her to say something, respond somehow.

"Could you excuse us for a minute?" Jack asked, addressing Everett Pinkham the nutritionist, who hardly had the appearance of a man who knew anything at all about nutrition.

"Certainly, certainly. Hope I haven't interrupted anything. I'll give you two all the time you need." He said genially, waving his hand at Jack. Then he lumbered out of the room, closing the door behind him with such force that it shook the doorframe.

Then there was silence.

"Kate?"

"What?"

Jack was immensely relieved to hear her answer him."What were you about to say?" he asked her more quietly.

She gave a soft, almost inaudible sigh as if she regretted bringing up the subject in the first place. Then she went back to wringing her hands. Finally, she spoke, tentatively at first. "I… didn't want… on the island…" a flash of frustration crossed her visage, and she began again. "When I was on the island, I think… I think I was the happiest. The happiest I've ever been. I know that's weird. I mean, our plane crashed on an uncharted island, and that's where I was the happiest? But, after a while… I guess I thought we'd never be rescued, and we'd stay the same way we were, forgotten by everyone except for ourselves. I liked it that way. And I liked that no one on the island asked what I'd done to become a criminal. The only person who knew was you. And I didn't mind about _you _knowing." She smiled a little at him. "Because after a while, nothing that happened before the plane crash mattered any more. No one cared that… Sayid was part of the Republican Guard or… Claire was going to give Aaron away. Because…" She stopped, swallowed hard, and stared up at the ceiling.

"Because we were safe." Jack finished softly. He thought he was beginning to understand why she had tried to remove him from her life. He thought that maybe he could relate.

"Because we were safe." She echoed wonderingly. "You, and me, and our little society we'd all made. I know it wasn't perfect. God, it wasn't. It was scary and weird… but somehow, parts of our lives were all right. Parts of it felt okay. I mean, I was kind of used to uncertainty and danger and everything. And then, just like that. It was all over. We were back, and what we'd done before was chasing us again. Or at least, that was the case with me. Not you, I bet. You're so…" Kate looked at him ruefully, and Jack thought he saw a flash of envy. "You're so normal. I…" Jack watched her, seemingly subconsciously glance down at the handcuff on her wrist. "I didn't want you to see what happened to me when I wasn't safe anymore."

She had said all she could, and after she was finished, Kate looked exhausted. They didn't talk for a few minutes; just sat and thought.

"I wish I'd come anyways." Jack then said agonizingly, almost speaking to himself.

"What?" said Kate sharply.

"You won't talk to _anyone, _Kate! I saw what happened, when the nutritionist came in. It was like you froze over. It's not healthy to be so antisocial, Kate. And then, there's the small problem that you won't _eat_ anything." He felt himself become patronizing, and knew it irked Kate. Hell, it irked himself. He wasn't her mother, for God's sake. But he couldn't help it. He was at a loss for what else to do. He didn't know how to tell her he felt he played a part in her depression. But she could tell without his saying so.

"You're blaming yourself for all of this." Kate stated flatly. She frowned up at him.

Jack blurted, "Well, you haven't been able to do much by yourself. And I just feel like, if I'd been –"

"Don't be so conceited, Jack." She bristled. Her cheeks flushed a little more, though they had already been feverish and pink. "I've kind of been having a hard time lately. You can't fix everything."

How could she have switched so quickly from so subdued to so upset? Dammit, he always said the wrong thing. And Jack was surprised to see Kate so harsh as well. She was almost acting the way she had back in the port when they were rescued, and she was taken to prison. He debated with himself over how to react. But for the second time that morning, she saved him from saying anything that might worsen the already tense conversation.

"Look." She seemed to be trying to compose herself. "I'm sorry. I'm… I'm not myself. I ache all over, I think I have a migraine, there's a needle sticking out of my arm… Forget what I said. Please. I just don't know… I didn't want…" she looked up at him now, pleadingly. She looked imploring, even pained. "I don't want to fight with you now that you've come. I'm the one that pushed you away. Please, don't think any of this is _your fault._ It was all me, okay?"

Jack gave a hesitant smile, relief flooding through him. He opened his mouth, wanting to say something that would make her melancholy fade away, something that would make her smile. God, he missed her grin.

Unfortunately, that very moment, Everett Pinkham threw open the door with a loud "Hel-lo!" and either impervious to or unaware of now both Kate's and Jack's frosty glares, he collapsed uninvited into the chair across the room that barely held him, and began talking about the importance of food.


	3. Rubbed the Wrong Way

**A/N nikki-de-latina - Haha thanks so much! And yeah, I know what you mean. : D**

**Orlando-crazy - Thanks! I will try as hard as possible to get each chapter out fast, but as you can see, I'm not so good at that. I'll DO MY VERY VERY BEST.**

**Thank you everyone who is reviewing, I really appreciate any feedback. And readers, it only takes half a minute to review, by the way... hint hint! **

* * *

"Just a little." Jack pleaded. "Just the salad, if you think that's all you can handle."

Kate glared down at her tray of food as if it had done her a personal wrong. An unrecognizable hunk of meat, yellowy mashed potatoes and a very wilted salad. "What if I told you I wasn't hungry?" she asked, knowing she was being difficult and not being able to help it.

Jack sat down on the edge of her bed, rolling his eyes. "Then I would be forced to feed you myself." He challenged.

Kate gave him a grudging smile. "If you value your life, you won't try that." Then she frowned down at her food again, violently stabbed a forkful of greenish-brown lettuce, and swallowed it resentfully.

At that moment, a nurse entered the room, not bothering to knock. She was a sixty-ish grandmotherly type, but the bad kind of grandmother. The kind you wanted to slap if they pinched your cheek one more time. "Ooooh good girl, Katherine!" She squealed. "Eat as much as you can! Dig in, and for heaven's sake, don't mind me!"

Kate found it hard to "not mind her" as the nurse – Betty or Dottie or whoever – began poking all sorts of little needles in her arm. She shifted uncomfortably. Why did everyone in the hospital treat her like she was five years old? And she just wanted to be alone with Jack, uninterrupted by Pinkham or the thousands of nurses that were forever checking up on her, acting like she was a silly little girl who needed to eat so she could grow up with strong bones. And yet Kate would ten times rather be here than back in prison.

* * *

"When do you think Kate will be sent back to prison?" Laura sat at the table, staring blankly at the ceiling. She glanced over at Morgan, who was on her opposite side, both elbows propped up on the table and reading a People magazine. Laura's prison roommate was always reading a shitty tabloid. It was usually People. This one had Colin Farrell or Will Ferrel or someone on it; Laura neither knew nor cared. She wasn't interested in the least about what the big celebrities were up to. She was too immersed in her own life, thank you very much. As if she could manage to scrap up a slight bit of curiosity for that crap. They were just rich people who possibly could sing or act or hit a ball with a stick. What was going on – here, now – that was what mattered.

Morgan didn't care about anything or anyone. Not Laura, not Kate, not herself, even. That's why she had to feign interest in something, anything. Magazines. Shit about the shit in other people's lives because she refused to acknowledge her own.

Laura knew she was being kind of harsh and condemning when it came to Morgan. But she just couldn't stand her cellmate's indifference to everything. The truth was, Laura was frigging jealous. Morgan never worried about whether she'd be convicted, whether she'd spend the rest of her life holed up, whether people despised her, loved her, missed her, visited her… it was infuriating to be in so much frigging pain and to live next to a woman who felt none.

Morgan finally looked up from her damn magazine. She glanced at Laura for a moment, raising her dark eyebrows. "Why do you care about _Kate?_ You don't know her."

A typical Morgan response. _Why are you asking me? Why do you care? Why should I care? _It pissed Laura off. She didn't bother to answer why, and Morgan soon settled back into the crap she was reading.

* * *

The door opened, and to Kate's dread, Everett Pinkham stepped in. "Hello, hello, hello!" he boomed obnoxiously. Kate fought the urge to hide underneath the covers. She tried to sink a little more into her bed, as if maybe she could disappear if she hunkered down enough.

"How are we doing this fine morning?" Pinkham asked, feeling free to plop himself down in the chair across from her.

Kate didn't answer maybe he would go away. She could sense Jack looking at her and silently asking her to talk. She knew it scared him when she didn't talk to people. He felt guilty about all of this, which was ridiculous. As if any of this was his fault. But still, for him…

"Fine." She said quietly.

He looked surprised to hear her voice. "Well, that's just wonderful. Wonderful! Well, listen." As if Kate had a choice. "I would like to have a little chat with you… alone." He looked sideways at Jack, smiling a grotesque grin.

_No, no no. Have a little chat, fine, but don't tell Jack to leave. _But Jack nodded understandingly. He gave her a small, encouraging but also imploring smile, and left the room, shutting the door with a small click.

"So, Katherine." Pinkham said, slapping his hands onto his knees. "I hear you ate today! Good on you, good on you." He waited for her to say something, as if she was going to clap her hands like a delighted child and say, 'Oh yes, it was wonderful!' He didn't get anything.

"I hear you were a big runaway for a while, eh? Finally gotcha, though, didn't they?"

_Oh, God, kill me now. If this guy thinks our conversation's going to consist of me telling him my life story, he's crazy. _She refused to acknowledge him._ No way._

Pinkham looked at her for a moment, his disgusting smile still on his face, but showing a bit of nervousness. His mop of hair was obstructing one of his piggy eyes. He batted it away and went on. "I hear you'll only talk to your friend who's always here – Jake? Jack?"

Frustration welled up inside of her. Wasn't it obvious she didn't want to have small talk with him? Maybe she should just get this over with, so he could be on his merry little way. She glared at him and tried to sit up straighter. It was hard to look formidable when you were hooked up to an i.v. and handcuffed to a bed rail.

"You've heard a lot. You must be a real gossip." She told him icily. "I'm talking to you now, so what do you need from me?"

He was taken aback. He looked like a fish with his mouth hung open, about to speak. Finally, he managed to say, "Uhh. Well. Right." He cleared his throat again, and glanced at the clock on the wall. Then he switched gears entirely. "Katherine, do you think… do you think you're 'fat'?"

This time it was Kate who was caught not knowing how to respond. She looked down at her stomach, where she knew her ribs were protruding alarmingly. Her arms and legs were all bony. She always felt weak and sick. Of course she didn't think she was obese. Anorexia hadn't even come into her mind. She wasn't starving herself on purpose. She didn't _think_ about it at all. In jail, she wasn't thinking about taking care of herself. She was trying not to think about anything, though that never worked. She would spend hours on end thinking about Jack, the island, the plane crash, Tom, her mother, her brother, swirling around in her head, spinning around her thoughts until she wanted to puke her guts out.

"No." she said simply, as if it were obvious. She knew that it wasn't. "No."

"Did you feel lost in the shuffle, Katherine? Unloved? Were you lonely?" Pinkham leaned forward, apparently trying to look understanding. "Because there are other ways of getting attention –"

"I wasn't trying to get attention!" Kate ejected vehemently. "I was just… I wasn't thinking about…"

"Would you call yourself depressed?" Pinkham asked slowly, his furry eyebrows rising.

Kate sighed deeply. She looked out the window. It was raining. Continuous rivers of water dripped down the pane so she couldn't see anything but a blurry mess of gray. "Yes." She said very quietly, still looking away.

Pinkham didn't say anything for a while. Kate thought he still expected her to begin pouring out all her woes to him. Ha. What a joke.

"Do you want some pills? I could get a doctor to give you a subscription for Zoloft, or –"

Kate's head snapped back. "Aren't you a _nutritionist? _What do you have to do with depression?"

"Well, nothing. I'm just trying to help. I just thought that perhaps you'd want an anti-depressant. You'd be surprised to know how many of your prison mates take anti-depressants. Or maybe you'd like to talk to someone? A therapist –"

"What I'd like is for Jack to come back." Kate said firmly, but she felt disgusted with herself as she heard her voice quiver a little when she said 'Jack'.

Pinkham looked faintly exasperated, but he stood up to Kate's pure relief. "All, right. All, right, Katherine." He said resignedly, and left the room.

Kate pulled up her knees and wrapped her arms around them tightly, the sound of the chain on the handcuff rattling and ringing through the otherwise silent room. It hurt her ears, even though it wasn't loud. She turned her head, and went back to watching the gray rain stream down the window.


	4. Meeting Fate

Jack sat against the bedpost next to Kate. She was curled up on her side, watching the television mounted on the wall. The program was some old western movie, made in the seventies or earlier. The volume was down low, but Jack could still hear the whoops of joy from the cowboy on the screen. He was riding a wild, black horse across a plain. Underneath his hat whipped long strands of blond hair, and he was grinning so much that Jack thought he looked almost insane.

He hadn't pegged Kate as the type to watch old westerns, but then again, she didn't look too enthralled. Her arm rested underneath her head, her mouth turned down slightly in a small frown. Her eyes kept drooping and closing for a second, then snapping open again. It was clear she was exhausted, but for whatever reason, didn't want to drift off.

Jack fought the urge to smile. He had seen Kate have this familiar fight to stay awake so many times on the island, and it was good to see her with an old habit. Almost every night, in fact, he would see her try to ward off the inevitable sleep. They would be in their tent, warm and comfortable, and he would watch her become more and more sleepy, her eyes closing for a moment, and then opening again in weak protest. Why wouldn't she allow herself to succumb to rest?

He looked down at her again. She seemed to be asleep. He could hear her breathing slowly and quietly, and her eyelashes were dark against her cheeks. But then he could see her tired eyes open again.

"He reminds me of Sawyer." She mumbled unexpectedly.

"What?" Jack was confused.

"On the TV. He looks like Sawyer."

He looked up at the screen again at the cowboy. "Huh. Yeah, a little." He said.

There was a beat in which Kate slowly inched closer to him. "Do you talk to them much? From the island, I mean?" She looked a little sad, lonely even. Jack wondered for the thousandth time how she had managed two months without a person in the world to confide in.

He grinned at her mischievously. "Yeah, the other day, me and Sawyer talked for hours on the phone. Really, I just don't know where the time went."

Kate smirked, and shoved him playfully with her bony elbow. "Ha, ha. Okay, so not Sawyer. Anyone?"

"Yeah. I mean, we're not having island barbecue reunions every weekend, but we keep in touch. Steve, remember Steve?"

She nodded.

"He wrote a book about it all. Kind of a memoir about the crash and us and all the wierd stuff that happened. Apparently it got good reviews and a lot of sales. But get this - his publishers refused to call it non-fiction. I guess all the explorers and scientists and everyone haven't found any monsters or polar bears on the island yet. And…Libby's been e-mailing me. She's good. Jin and Sun stayed in the States. They live in L.A. too, actually. I've seen them a few times. Um… Charlie and Claire are the ones I see the most. We meet for dinner sometimes."

Kate smiled and tried to cover up a yawn with her hand. "How are they?"

"They're really happy. They live in a little house about a half hour away from the city. With Aaron, of course. They say he won't stop talking." Jack smiled too. "He's cute. And I think Charlie's going to propose to Claire."

Kate, now fully awake, gave a very uncharacteristic, girly squeal of excitement. "No way! Really?"

Jack laughed warmly. "Yeah. I think so. He kind of hinted at it by accident on the phone last week. Maybe I'm wrong, but it really seems like any day…"

Just then, a doctor entered the room, carrying her unpleasant tray of needles, tongue depressors and thermometers, interrupting their conversation. Kate looked annoyed, but didn't say anything. He could understand why; it seemed like every time they were talking, it was the opportune moment for a doctor to make rounds or a nurse to check up on her, or – worst of all – Pinkham to show up.

When the doctor had finished vexing Kate enough, she stepped back with a falsely cheery expression. "Well, your temperature's down, dehydration's decreased…and no more headaches?" Kate shook her head. "You've improved a lot. You can probably get going today!"

Kate looked up sharply. "What?" From the look on her face, Jack could tell she was shocked.

He was too. In fact, he was pissed. He stood up and angrily addressed the doctor. "What about her nutrition? She's 5'5 and _96 pounds!_" He threw an arm out wide in exasperation. "Kate's only been here three days, and she's just been discovered to have anorexia. You can't discharge her if she still needs medical attention! I can understand why she can't go to rehab, but to be discharged after only –"

"Dr. Shepherd, Katherine is supposed to be awaiting her trial in prison without bail . I was told to do my best to send her back as soon as possible. Of _course_ she'll be monitored carefully. She'll receive visits from her nutritionist twice a week and have routine doctor's appointments. But I'm afraid she can't stay here. But we'll kick this habit, right, Katherine?" She turned enthusiastically to Kate.

The only thing Jack wanted to kick right now was this doctor's face.

Kate was still staring at the doctor in disbelief. Finally, she ran her hand across her face and spoke in a low voice. "My name is Kate _Kate. Not Katherine._ Can you go now?"

* * *

Katewas discharged from St. Sebastian's at 4:53 PM. The two policemen that were to escort her across the city to prison kindly allowed them a few minutes to say goodbye.

It was busy in the lobby. Other patients were leaving the hospital, and visitors were entering through the automatic sliding doors. Kate looked embarrassed to be seen in publicwearing handcuffs, and Jack nonchalantly stood in front of her so her chained wrists were blocked from view of any passersby.

She stood closely to him, her head tilted up to his face. She had her arms wrapped around her stomach tightly, as if she was trying to protect herself from something. Her eyes never left his face, and they were a full of tears as they were full of misery.

He knew she hated when she cried. She didn't like to make a scene. But then, her whole life was a scene, wasn't it?

"You know I'll visit you any time the prison says I can. Whatever the visiting hours are – I'll change my whole work schedule around if I have to. You know that, right?" He tried to look reassuring, but he knew he could reassure her about anything at that moment. She had an expression that clearly said that all was lost. It scared him.

She nodded, and pressed her lips together so that they turned white.

He blinked several times. Okay, he didn't like to make a scene either. "Just… please take care of yourself, Kate. I'm worried."

She nodded again. "I know you are. I will." She whispered, almost as if she were reciting rules back to a parent. She took a shaky breath. Her eyes flickered to the floor and back to his again. "Listen. I never thanked you for sticking through with me."

Jack immediately waved away the memory of the words she had said to him at the port the day they were rescued, the words that had hurt him so much. "I know you didn't mean anything you said that day –"

"I don't mean just that." Kate interrupted soberly. "I'm not… I'm not a normal person. I don't know how long I'm going to be in prison, Jack. So, what I'm saying is… if you ever got tired of all of this, or if you found someone who…"

Jack almost laughed at the absurdity of what she was trying to say to him. "I'm not leaving you, Kate." He told her firmly. "I can't believe you'd actually think–"

"It's not _fair to you,_ Jack!" she cried. She breathed deeply again, trying to calm herself down. "I'm just… letting you know."

Jack leaned down and held her, and kissed her. "I'm not leaving you." he repeated into her hair.


	5. The Refrain

**A/N Okay, so I'm not going to give anything away about next episode, but let's just saw I saw a couple promo pictures and I AM SO EXCITED! And now for something completely different. I've finally mapped out Waiting for the Music to Begin in its entirety, and it's probably going to be 19 or 20 chapters. This is Part I and Part II will be the last three chapters, if everything goes according to plan. plots evilly. Enjoy!**

* * *

Laura sat idly at the table, staring down at her hands. Of course she was sitting idly. She never knew what to do with herself. She could read a book, but she was never a big reader, and besides, the prison library sucked. She could sleep, but she had done enough of that today. She could try to hold a conversation with Morgan, but that never turned out to be worth it. Morgan's side of the little chat almost invariably consisted of "yeah" or a noncommittal "Hmm", and if Laura was lucky, Morgan would sometimes glance up from her magazine or newspaper.

Laura looked over at her from the corner of her eye. There she was; her feet up on the table, displaying prison-issued boots with trailing, untied shoelaces. Morgan had her nose in the Comics section of a newspaper. There was typical Morgan – not giving a damn about anything that matters.

Laura leaned back in her hard, wooden chair and closed her eyes. Her beautiful Ben's face loomed up in her mind unexpectedly. His mouth was turned up in a happy grin as it always used to be, little wrinkled forming at the corners of his own clear, laughing eyes. She hadn't seen him smile - truly smile - in so long.

That familiar pain must have crossed her face, the one she often felt when she thought about Ben, because Morgan loudly asked,

"What's wrong with you?"

Laura chose to ignore the rude question. She was sick of dealing with Morgan's shitty attitude. Whenever Morgan spoke to her, it was with an unkind, careless tone that made Laura wonder why she ever wanted to have a discussion wither in the first place. She remained where she was, and Morgan didn't press her. But Laura's eyes snapped open when she heard the all-too familiar creaking noise that meant the cell door was opening.

To Laura's astonishment, Kate Austen was being led through the door by two policemen. As the cell door closed and was locked, she stayed standing awkwardly, her hands at her sides, her eyes darting around at Morgan, then at Laura.

Morgan lazily removed her feet from the table, looking the embarrassed-looking Kate over slowly.

"Well," she said slowly. "If it isn't Miss Manic Depression?" She smirked, and a faint pink tinged on Kate's pale cheeks.

"Yeah, sorry about all that before." She said softly. Then, she decisively moved to her bed and sat down on the edge.

Both Morgan's and Laura's gazes followed Kate. Laura was surprised to hear Kate speak. _And _she was neither insane nor catatonic. She did look helplessly sad, though.

Morgan's cruel smirk remained on her face, and Laura thought she was beginning to hate her.

"Hark!" Morgan exclaimed. "She speaks!"

"Morgan!" Laura hissed, horrified. Their other roommate seemed so fragile that she would at any piece moment; break into a million pieces on the floor.

But Kate only grimaced, and looked around the cell as if she'd never seen it before. Maybe it felt to her as if she hadn't. As Laura looked loosely at her, she noticed that she did look healthier than before. Though she was still as skinny and pale as ever, Kate looked – Laura contemplated for a moment. Kate looked like she had crawled out of the ugly, despairing hole that she had been in before she was taken to the hospital. She was talking, yes. But there was more. There was emotion in her face, as if she was sad, but slightly… hopeful too.

"So, what's there to do here?" Kate asked, looking up and addressing Laura.

Laura smiled.

**

* * *

Jack drove home alone from the hospital. He didn't know why he did feel so alone – he always commuted by himself. But the car seemed so quiet and empty that he felt like he wanted to roll down the window and jump out.**

The traffic was horrible, and normally he was impatient to get home and finally relax after a tedious, long day. And it had probably been one of the longest afternoons of his life. After all, he had found her again and lost her once more in a matter of days. All he could think of was her expression of grief as the police led her away. And he suddenly knew that he couldn't go home to an empty apartment; the loneliness would kill him.

Jack's eyes strayed from the road for a moment as he fumbled for his cell phone. He dialed a number and waited for someone on the other line to pick up.

"Hello?" a woman's voice answered.

"Hey, it's Jack." He was so relieved to hear her voice.

"Jack!" she cried. She sounded happy to hear him as well.

"I was wondering if you were free to, um… go to dinner tonight."

"I bet you could use someone to talk to." She answered promptly. There was sympathy in her voice, he could hear it even through the bad reception of his phone and the honking of the car horns outside his window. "Sure we can go to dinner." The woman said. "I just need to find a sitter."

Jack smiled. Dinner with Claire and Charlie was exactly what he needed.

**

* * *

When Kate woke up, there was a shaft of sunlight hitting her in the face. She opened her eyes blearily and looked around. The light was coming from the one small rectangular window in the cell. The rest of the cell was dark. _There's irony for you. The one bit of light in the whole cell is right where it sears out my eyes._** Kate woke up, there was a shaft of sunlight hitting her in the face. She opened her eyes blearily and looked around. The light was coming from the one small rectangular window in the cell. The rest of the cell was dark. 

As far as she could tell, Morgan and Laura were still asleep. She sat up and tried to stretch her arms – instead she only scraped her hand on the roof of her bed.

"Dammit!" she swore loudly. She looked at her hand, where there was a long, angry scratch already starting to bleed. She hadn't slept in a bunk bed since she was at a sleepover when she was in elementary school. Damn bunk beds.

"Huh?" Someone mumbled. Laura stirred from the other side of the room. "What's up?"

"Sorry. I didn't mean to be loud." Kate said quickly. "Just scratched my hand."

Laura shook her head, unfazed. "Doesn't matter. I'm up now." Disregarding the ladder provided for her to climb down the top bunk, she jumped gracefully like a cat to the floor. "God, I can't wait to get a cup of coffee." She muttered to herself as she rubbed her eyes. She had evidently fallen asleep with her hair up in a ponytail, because her blonde hair was half in an elastic band, half all over her forehead and face. She didn't seem to notice or care. She sat down at the table, and Kate moved to do the same, still clutching her hand and trying to stop the bleeding.

"You never answered my question." Kate whispered, still thinking about the sleeping Morgan.

"What question?" Laura pulled up her knees so that she was sitting cross-legged in her chair. She didn't bother to keep her voice down; in fact, she seemed to be speaking rather loudly, as if she was intentionally trying to annoy Morgan.

"What's there to do around here?" Kate asked, repeating the question she had asked the previous afternoon.

Laura chuckled and shook her head. "Well. You can sleep, look out the window and stare at the wall. You can drool if you really want to. What else? Um… wallow in self-pity…" she glanced at Kate, and bluntly said, "You've covered that one enough, I think."

Kate actually laughed. It was good to hear Laura state it as if what she'd done was almost normal. Nothing insane, nothing having to do with disorders or diseases.

Laura leaned back in her chair precariously, and rolled her eyes up to the ceiling. "See, prison's like those Chinese torture things. You're tied to a board, and all you can see is one drop of water forming over you." She motioned with her hand, as if it really was above her head. "You just wait, and wait and wait for that drop of water to fall and hit you on the forehead. Then!" She hit her palm hard on the table, causing Kate to jump. "It finally falls! And you wait for next one to form and drop all over again. And they leave you like that for days and weeks, nothing else to do, until you go crazy."

She looked ominously at Kate, and the light mood she had had vanished. Instead was a grim face and intense eyes that said everything she had just said was the God's truth.

"You've put a lot of time into your description." Kate said finally.

"That's all you have here. Time. And those three hours every Saturday." When Kate looked at her questioningly, Laura explained. "Visitor's hours."

The gravity Laura used with those two plain words made Kate know with a deep certainty that visitor's hours were all she lived for. All that mattered at all for Laura. And she could understand completely.

"Chinese torture. Just waiting for visits, hour after hour. Then your time on Saturday goes so quickly, and you're back to where you started – just waiting."

"I'm good at waiting." Kate said fiercely. _Waiting for acceptance from her family. Waiting for something bad to happen. Waiting for the cops to catch her. Waiting for her Dad to find her. Waiting for rescue. Waiting for someone like Jack. _

Laura gave a mirthless laugh. "I'm jealous."


	6. This Will Never Last

**A/N. All I have to say is, ALMOST TWO WEEKS WITHOUT THE INTERNET. That's all I have to say. I'm lucky to be alive. So, here is my belated sixth chapter. And I must say, I'm incredibly frustrated. Because despite the fact lest episode was AMAZING, it totally ruined the planned end of this fic. Mrrrrrr.**

**Oh, and I keep forgetting to credit my title! "Waiting for the Music to Begin" is a song from The Witches of Eastwick. iy's about a woman who was taught to play her violin with exact precision and never with any feeling, and she waits all her life for the passion she thinks music should have. You can draw the parallels, I think. :D**

* * *

Day Two. Day two in prison of… how many? Kate tried not to think about it, but the more she tried, the more it plagued her. She didn't even know when her trial was, no one had bothered to tell her since she'd gotten back from the hospital, and she had no idea who to ask. Kate felt sick thinking about the trial. It would just be a confirmation that she'd rot away in a cell all her life. She'd go crazy.

"Kate?"

She opened her eyes grudgingly and looked up. Laura was bent slightly over her bed, her arms crossed. Her lips were pressed together, as if she had something unpleasant to say.

"I was wondering, um, if you'd come to the cafeteria?" she asked softly. "I know you don't want to, and I don't mind bring you food like I have been doing, but… I was, like, cornered, by this guy in a suit at breakfast? And he, like, told me to peer pressure you or something? To eat?" Laura's sentences always ended in a question, as if she was unsure about the validity of what she was saying. She raised her pencil-thin eyebrows.

Damn it. Why did it feel as if Kate was being watched by a stern teacher? Couldn't she do anything of her free will? If she didn't want to be in a huge crowd of other murderers and God knows what else, shouldn't that be okay? But she groaned and got up reluctantly. She didn't want to go to the cafeteria, but she sure as hell didn't want to stay in the cell any longer.

* * *

The cafeteria, as Kate had expected, was loud, huge, and gray. There were immensely long tables in rows all the way down the gigantic hall. In the entrance, Kate froze for a moment, her stomach doing backflips. The place was packed with orange-clad prisoners. She felt like she had suddenly developed that phobia, the fear of people. What was it called? All she knew was that her mind was screaming "Go back!"

She was, after so many years, where people could stare and gawk. They could look down on her and judge her and ask her questions. Everyone on the planet knew who she was, for Christ's sake. She looked behind her, wishing she could just bolt back to the cell.

Laura turned, aware that Kate had stopped in her tracks. "What is it?"

Kate shook her head, and followed Laura to the lunch line.

After they had gotten their less-than-gourmet food, Laura led her to a fairly populated table and sat down, greeting a few women slouching over their food. One was a frowning African-American with long bangs that swooped down into her eyes. The girl next to her looked not a day older than eighteen, with highlighted blonde hair, a pierced nose, and pointed eyebrows. Kate sat next to Laura. On her other side was a short, overweight woman, perhaps in her fifties or sixties.

"Kate." Laura said, jerking her thumb beside her as a way of introduction to the others.

The girl took a big bite out of her sandwich before saying bluntly, "Hey. I'm Joce. I shot my Mom."

The other woman across the table only nodded at Kate, an expression of recognition in her face and curiosity in her dark eyes. Kate looked down quickly. _Please don't talk to me. Please don't._

But it was the prisoner beside her that spoke. "Kate Austen?" she asked, her voice low and boisterous.

_Dammit. Shit shit shit. Get me out of here now._ Kate picked up her own sandwich. It looked like chicken salad, but she wasn't quite sure. She felt a little nauseous just looking at it. Or maybe her nausea was caused by the fact that several more heads had turned to look at her once her name was spoken. She tried to tell herself that she had expected this. She should have been prepared for an interrogation once she left the cell. She should have been ready.

Kate tried to pretend she was really, really interested in her sandwich, still refusing to return the glances her way.

But the overweight woman didn't relent, despite Kate's obvious discontent. "Feds chased after you for how long? Three, four years? Damn! You don't look crafty enough, little thing like you. You were the one who blew up your dad, right?"

The words rang in her ears. They echoed strangely. She'd never heard them spoken out loud, not so matter-of-factly, so crudely. They made her feel cold and sick inside, and for a moment, she didn't think she'd be able to hold down the couple of bites of her sandwich she had already taken.

Then she stood up abruptly, the chair making a horrible scraping noise, and walked away briskly. She stared at the ground intently. Red tile, brown tile, red tile, brown tile. This hall was so damn big, and she could feel the eyes follow her all the way down. Her feet couldn't move fast enough.

* * *

The escort guard led her up the stairs. The cafeteria was on the second floor, and her cell on the seventh. Her panic had slowed slightly, and she passed a hand over her face, rubbing her eyes tiredly.

Each flight was the same – fifteen steps, gray walls, blue railings. A door at the top of the flight. Floor 3, Cells 1-60. Floor 4, Cells 61-120. Kate wondered how many miserable prisoners were in this building.

Finally, they reached Floor 7, and Kate was struck by how out of breath she was. Her heart was actually beating faster, as if she had run a long way. She was amazed and embarrassed. She was the one who could travel fifty miles a day on foot. She could climb the highest tree in the jungle with ease and agility. Now she couldn't climb a few stairs? She tried not to show the guard her weakness, but her breath was short and heavy.

Back in the cell, Kate was alone at last. She collapsed onto her bunk. Leaning her back against the headboard, her legs out straight, her arms crossed. She missed Jack, and it had only been two days.

Jack, who had stuck by her with all her problems and sins and situations. Why had he stayed by her? He was so good. She was always wondering why he was so good, and he why he would love her still. And he did. She could feel it when he touched her face, when he hugged her so close, when he kissed her. She loved him too, more than anything or anyone she'd ever known.

_

* * *

It was morning – she could tell by the small shaft of bluish light through the tent flap. Early morning, but the majority of those that lived on the beach seemed to be waking earlier and earlier each day. They were sick of sleep and denial that there was work to be done. Besides, Kate was up now, and she knew she wouldn't be able to fall back to sleep._

_She sat up, realizing with annoyance that she had rolled off the tarp that served as her sleeping bag. Her clothes were covered with sand, as was one side of her face. She wiped the fine grains off her cheeks and brushed at her shirt. Where was her mirror? She reached for her duffel bag, which was lying behind her on the ground._

"_Kate?"_

_She recognized Jack's quiet voice immediately from behind the tent flap. She'd even been expecting it._

"_I'm awake." She answered._

_He pushed back the flap and came into view, looking tired, but pleased to see her. He sat down beside her without invitation. It had started to become a routine. In the morning, Jack would come by her tent, and they would sit, side by side in the sand. They would talk and laugh softly while the sun rose outside. Or sometimes, they would simply sit and enjoy the silence of each other's company, the only sound the crashing of the waves. It was comfortable and natural. Their time in the mornings had quickly become Kate's favorite part of the day._

"_It's been three months." Jack finally said. "Three months since we've been here. Did you realize that?"_

_Kate shook her head. "Feels like I've been here years." She breathed in the salty air. "I wish I could be." she half-whispered._

_Jack looked knowingly down at her. "Maybe we will." He told her, his eyes delving into hers. "It's been this long already."_

"_It'll never be long enough. My luck runs out after a while." Kate said, trying not to sound incredibly bitter, and knowing she did all the same. She stared at the tent flap ahead of her, too afraid to look at Jack. She knew once she did, the lump in her throat would only get worse. _

_But before she knew it, she was leaning against his shoulder, her arm entwined around his for support, silent tears leaking out of both her eyes at an alarming rate. This will never last, she kept thinking, as he pulled her closer to him, speaking calmly and consolingly. This will never last. _

* * *

Kate felt a sharp pain in her side, and looked around, bewildered. Morgan was standing over the bed, glowering.

"So I gotta kick you for you to listen to me?" Morgan hissed. "I've been yelling at you for five minutes, goddamn it." Without even telling Kate what she'd originally wanted, she stomped over to the table and sat down in a huff like a child who didn't get her way.

Kate rubbed her side, where the pain was dulling. Had Morgan really been yelling at her? She hadn't heard a thing; it was as if she was in some kind of trance, thinking about the island and Jack. That wasn't normal, was it? Normal. Now, there was a word that didn't describe anything having to do with Kate.


	7. Exploding Time Bombs

**A/N Ta-da! I haven't died! Well, here it is, my friends. And I'd really appreciate it if you'd review. I post this on to get feedback, criticism, anything. I want a reaction! So, thank you loyal reviewers, and anyone else who has the slightest incliantion to review, please do. Thanks, guys!**

* * *

Kate was reading the newspaper. Actually, she was only scanning it. There wasn't really anything that interested her, and even though she had nothing but time, she hadn't really been able to focus on anything that was going on around her. It had been six days. She still didn't know who to talk to about her trial, still couldn't figure out what was wrong with her and why she went into weird trances, and still couldn't face the cafeteria. Laura had gone back to bringing her food and depositing it on the table. Kate usually made an effort to eat it.

She'd gone to see Pinkham the other day, or rather he'd come to the prison to see her. She had been led into a conference room and forced to sit in a rigid wooden chair. The guard remained behind her, and she could feel his hand on her shoulder the entire time. She wanted to turn around and punch him hard in the stomach. Pinkham talked to her for a while, asking her stupid questions as if he was a second-rate therapist and not her nutritionist. He gave her a checkup, and looked slightly pleased at the end.

As she was being led away, Pinkham put a fatherly hand on her shoulder. "Katherine, I hope this whole experience has made you see things differently. You seem to be taking a better course with a more positive attitude. You're eating fairly well, my dear, fairly well. Let's keep progressing, yes?"

Kate gave him an annoyed look and shrugged his pudgy hand off. "Yeah, sure." Pinkham didn't encourage her to eat. He made her want to jump out a window.

She turned the newspaper page uninterestedly, and then slapped it down on the table, exasperated. Why wasn't there anything in the whole forty-page thing?

Laura yawned, across the table. "Where's Morgan? She leaves the cell even less than you do – no offense. I don't know how you can stand it in here all the time. At least the rec room has a TV. and a couch."

"I don't know where she went." Kate answered, ignoring the rest of what Laura was saying. "She wasn't here when I woke up."

"That bitch is crazy." Laura informed her nonchalantly. "She's prob'ly getting the death sentence, did you know that? Everyone's been saying. She _doesn't care." _Laura rolled her eyes up at the ceiling and flicked her hair out of her eyes with an impatient swat of her hand._ "_No one's visited her the entire time she's been here, waiting for her trial. I think she's been in prison… maybe three months? _No one._ She doesn't care either. Hasn't made a single friend, doesn't talk to anybody. Talking to her is like talking to a rock."

Kate leaned back in her chair, thinking. "Maybe," she said quietly, "but that doesn't mean she doesn't care. I've met a lot of people who act like that." Sawyer. Shannon. Her own mother sometimes. _Herself._

* * *

Jack woke up with a stiff back and a headache. Opening his blurry eyes, he decided that he could probably accredit them to the fact that he had been sleeping _on the floor_. After the majority of a sleepless night with much tossing and turning, he must have fallen asleep and rolled off his bed.

Groaning, he sat up and rubbed his aching back. He needed coffee, and he needed it now. He got up and opened his bedroom door, being met immediately with a burst of bright, blinding light from his window. Squinting, he managed to make it across the room and flip on the coffee brewer. How had he survived on the island without it?

Just as he was pouring the black, steaming liquid into a mug, the doorbell rang, causing Jack to jump and spill hot coffee all over his hands. "Shit." He muttered, and ran back into his bedroom, threw on a pair of jeans and skidded back into the kitchen. Who the hell could be showing up out of the blue at his house so early? He glanced at the clock on the counter, which read 12:30 PM. Oh.

Claire stood in the hall, crossing her arms self-consciously over her light sundress. She had a little red backpack slung over her shoulder. "Hi, Jack." She said, venturing a small smile.

Jack smiled back, and let her in. "Hey, Claire." He said warmly. "I, uh, do you want some of the coffee I didn't spill on the floor?"

She laughed a little, and without invitation, sat herself down on his couch. She placed her backpack next to her and said, "Yeah, sure. Thanks."

After Jack had given her a mug and sat down across from her, she grinned nervously into the silence. "Um." She said finally. "Well, I wanted to talk to you. Is that okay?"

Jack chuckled. "Yes, Claire. That's okay. Although I have to go to work in… four hours. Is it going to take longer than that?"

Claire shook her head, but she wasn't smiling any more. "Well, it's not that serious. But… and you know I love Charlie, and everything's okay between me and him. Everything's okay." She repeated. "Everything's great."

"But…"

"But… it's that stupid band, Jack!" she blurted out. "You know how they got back together. They're not touring anywhere far away or anything, just around California, but he's gone a lot more than I thought he would. And there's Aaron to take care of, and I don't want this to get out of hand, you know?" She looked kind of panicked just thinking about it. She squeezed her cup of coffee with white knuckles, and had it been a wine glass, it would have shattered. "I guess after spending every waking moment on the island with him, I wasn't ready for… the real world. Jobs and his band and errands…" she raked a hand through her wavy and slightly snarled hair. She looked at Jack.

He was kind of confused. They were good friends, sure, but why wouldn't she just tell Charlie about this? Or at least one of her friends… _girl_ friends? He hadn't been prepared to talk about love woes.

"You're probably wondering why I came to you to talk about this?" she asked, echoing his thoughts uncannily. "Well, I just… I don't know." She cried exasperatedly. "You and I, we're having the same type of problems, aren't we? I mean, you miss Kate so much I bet. And I feel like Charlie's growing apart…" she looked at Jack hopefully.

But Jack was struck by this, and not in a good way. "What? How can you – you're comparing Kate being in jail to Charlie being in a band? In a band that he _loves_?" He stood up abruptly, and Claire looked startled. "I get to see her _once a week_ for two hours. And who knows what's going to happen after the trouble? She could be transferred, but let's not even concentrate on that. How about the fact that she could get a _life sentence_? Are you forgetting that? Not to mention, I don't know what she could be doing to herself there. She could be starving herself again, catatonic…she could be trying to kill herself, and _I wouldn't know_!" He glared at her, feeling somewhat relieved that he'd finally spat out his worries to someone, but at the same time, fiery with anger at Claire.

The anger ebbed slightly (but only slightly) when her eyes filled with tears and she stood up too, slamming the coffee down on the table. It sloshed around the rim and pooled onto the wood. She snatched up her backpack.

"Ok, Jack. I know you're having a hard time. What I didn't know was that you were a freaking time bomb waiting to go off! I was looking for a little _validation._ Or at least someone to _converse with_ besides my one year old son. Apparently I made a mistake choosing you." She slipped past him and quickly was out the door, stomping down the hall without another word.

Jack slumped wearily down on the couch. He hadn't meant to blow up at Claire. She hadn't really deserved it, even though he felt a boiling fury at her for even trying to compare her situation with his. He just couldn't believe she didn't understand. It seemed that no one in the world did (least of all his mother… not that he'd expected her to), except himself and Kate. Her trial was in less than a month, and he knew that if she made it out of there with anything less than twenty years in prison, it was a miracle. That made him sick. Kate would never last in there for twenty years. He knew that with a conviction like no other.

* * *

Night creeps over the prison like a disease, Kate thought sadly. Daytime was bad enough, but night was suffocating. She closed her eyes, and opened them again, seeing no difference. It was pitch black. That is, it was pitch black until, every fifteen minutes, when guards aimed their flashlights at the prisoners' faces to make sure they were all still there. Other than the shuffle of the guards' feet, the night was enveloped in a deep silence that made Kate wish she had a pair of headphones to listen to. She had always fallen asleep to sound, whether it was the sound of her mother's soft singing, or cars driving by her hotel, or waves dragging sand with the water. Now it was nothing.

Which was why Kate sat up with a jolt when her ears were pierced with a high-pitched, loud, scream.

At first, she was so flustered and confused that all she did was cover her ears with her hands. Then she saw several figures from behind the cell bars, and they were shouting and opening the door. They rushed into the cell and crowded around the bunk bed on the other side of the wall. That was when Kate realized that it was Morgan screaming as if she was dying.

Alarmed, Kate turned to the scene. Laura was sitting bolt upright on the top bunk, peering down below her. It was too dark to see much, just silhouettes, until, suddenly; the lights on the whole floor were flicked on, blinding her. Morgan was still shrieking, but Kate could hear loud complaints from neighboring cells.

When she could see again, she saw the scene next to her. Four or five guards in their black uniforms were crowded around the bed, but Kate could still see Morgan, and the sight scared her. Morgan's face was streaked with tears, her expression one of ultimate terror. Her eyes were squeezed shut, and her hands thrown out in front of her, in vain trying to block the forceful arms of the guards.

"Get _away_ from me!" Morgan wailed, fright in her tearing voice. "_Get away!_"

Those bastards were grabbing at her arms, her torso, trying to stop her from her hysterical fit.

Kate couldn't bear to sit there watching. She jumped up angrily, and shouted, "What the hell are you doing? Can't you see you're just making her worse! Stop it!" Without even thinking, she viciously shoved the nearest guard.

Before she even knew what happened, she had been violently thrown back, the wind knocked out of her, her head crashing sickeningly against the stone wall.


	8. Recovering and Resurfacing

"Hey, hey, hey. Look at me. Can you hear me? Okay? Look."

There was a voice in front of her, but she couldn't see anything but a blur of colors, swirling around in her vision, making her feel nauseous. She tried to focus on the blur ahead of her, but it swam in and out of focus as if she was looking through a camera lens. There were sounds all around her, but she couldn't make sense of them. They echoed around her, distorted and loud. She was so dizzy. She clutched at the thing behind her… what was it? A wall? At least it was something solid to hold onto. She pressed her hands against it and felt hard, rough cement blocks.

What was going on? She tried to think back to what she last remembered, but the voice spoke again, and she made an extreme effort to comprehend what it was saying.

"Look. I'm new here, okay? I don't wanna get in any more trouble than you do, yeah? Hey! Do you understand what I'm saying?"

Kate had briefly closed her eyes, but she opened them again slowly and tried to nod. It caused a searing pain in her head, so she stopped.

She felt rough hands on her shoulders and hot breath in her face. The voice was male, she knew that. But she didn't understand what he was talking about.

"I don't want to get fired." He continued. "And _you_ don't want to be in solitary for a month, _or_ have a jail record to add onto your list of fuck-ups in life, do you? Okay? So, let's make a little deal. _You_ don't report this to anybody, and _I _don't either. Yeah? Deal?" He shook her a little.

Kate nodded again. Anything to get this disgusting man off her. And a moment later, he did let go of her. She could hear hurried footsteps, then his voice again, farther away this time. "And _you_. If you want your visiting hours for the next year, you'll keep your goddamn mouth shut too.

Then she heard the scraping and clanging of a metal door closing, and Kate knew that she was still in jail. That was when she started to cry. They weren't noisy tears, but she felt them coursing down her cheeks and she bit back pained whimpers.

She heard another voice, this one female and familiar. "Hey, Kate. You're all right, Kate."

She flinched when she felt someone's hands on her arm. She blinked several times, wiped at her eyes to brush her tears away and her vision cleared slightly. Someone with short blonde hair was kneeling in front of her.

"It's okay, it's just me. It's Laura. I'm going to help you off the floor, okay?" Laura pulled her up by the arms and supported her by holding her around the waist. Kate felt the warmth of her bed as she sat down on it, but Laura stopped her from lying down.

"Hold on, Kate. Let me just look at your head. I'm no doctor, but I know you hit it pretty hard." Laura said soothingly.

"How…" Kate managed to ask, but she was interrupted, not by a person, but with the lights suddenly flickering off. She was met with darkness again, and this time she welcomed it. The light had been hurting her eyes. Besides, she couldn't imagine how she had looked, crying on the floor like a weak idiot. She must have seemed so pathetic. She _was_ pathetic.

"Shit." Laura exclaimed loudly. Kate jumped, causing another searing pain in her head. She hissed in pain.

"Sorry. The light..." Laura explained. "I'm going to get you some toilet paper to press against your head." She returned a second later, stumbling around in the darkness, and handed the sorry excuse for any medical aid to Kate. "That son of a bitch!" Laura whispered vehemently as Kate gingerly pressed the wad to the gash on the back of her head. "He knew you were just trying to help, and he just threw you across the room! And then he just leaves you there? I'm not trying to scare you here, but you're no pretty picture right now. What a bastard!"

It all flooded back to her – Morgan screaming, the guards rushing into the cell, and herself jumping up and pushing one aggressively. That was so _stupid_! Her and her stupid impulses. She grimaced at herself. What did she think she was going to achieve in doing that? Laura sat down next to her, and together, they waited for the sunlight.

* * *

Kate didn't sleep at all that night. She couldn't lie down without excruciating, throbbing pain in her head. Besides, Laura wouldn't leave, which worried Kate more than the dizziness or nausea or the wetness of the wad of toilet paper against her head. She must really be in a bad state if Laura wouldn't let her alone.

When the sun finally rose, it was covered by a thick layer of clouds. Still, it got brighter in the cell, and as it did, Kate could see the blood on the floor where she was thrown last night, and she shuddered and closed her eyes in shock. It looked like someone was murdered in here.

Laura must have been watching her reaction, because she got up and began cleaning the floor with more toilet paper without a word. Kate appreciated it immensely – Laura was truly being a friend, and Kate was about to say so, when Laura spoke for the first time in hours.

"I guess you know what today is?"

In a flash of panic, Kate wildly thought that maybe today was the day of her trial, but Laura answered her own question.

"It's visitor's day."

Kate's spirits went up with a leap. Despite the horrible pain and sick feeling and blood, the memories of last night making her want to cry like a baby… she would see Jack today. Just the thought made everything else vanish away, and she actually smiled. Laura smiled back at her.

"Yep. I almost forgot too. Imagine that."

* * *

Kate had felt too sick to eat anything that day, so she wasn't sure if she could accredit all of the lightheadedness to the events of last night. On her way to the visitor's hall, she would have fallen down the stairs if the escort guard hadn't grabbed her arm. He gave her a strange look, but Kate couldn't decipher it. She wondered if this was the guard who had struck his deal with her. But chances of that were slim – there were night guards and day guards, and besides, there must have been hundreds in the prison.

The visitor's hall was huge – there were four cafeteria-style tables that spanned the entire room. One side of the table was for visitors, one side was for prisoners. Guards patrolled the hall, traveling up and down the gaps between the tables, and listening in on conversations. There were already dozens of pairs – prisoner and loved one - sitting at the tables, talking, laughing, and crying. There were windows near the top of the high ceiling that cast a cheerful light over the entire hall. After only a second, Kate could identify the visitor's hall as the nicest room in the whole prison.

She scanned the hall quickly for Jack. She couldn't throw off the feeling that every second counted and she needed to find him as soon as possible. And – there he was! She saw him searching the room himself, looking for her in return. He looked casual in a pair of khakis and a solid blue collared shirt. His face was as eager as hers was, and she entertained the thought of pulling away from the guard's grasp and leaping over the table into Jack's arms. As it was, she aggressively pushed past several people to reach him.

Laughing with joy, she leaned as far as she could over the table to hug him. He pulled her so close that she could feel her legs digging painfully into the side of the table. He smelled like soap and cold outside air. He looked the same, to her relief. She told herself she was being stupid, how could he have changed in a week? But still, it was a comfort for him to look the way she'd left him a week ago at the hospital. Jack kissed her softly, and placed his hand on her head.

Kate jerked away, swallowing a scream of pain as she felt a terrible stinging in her head. She felt another wave of dizziness, and collapsed quickly into her chair.

Jack was looking at her, confused and concerned. "What is it, Kate? Are you –"

"I'm okay." She said, waving him away. She passed a hand over her eyes. "I'm just… I'm just a little dizzy."

"Have you eaten today? Pinkham said-"

She shook her head, trying to smile. "No, it's not that I'm hungry. I… I hit my head last night." She was suddenly gripped with the horrible thought of being listened in on. There were no guards around, but what about the other people around her? Not to mention, what if the room was bugged? Much as she wanted to tell Jack what happened, she was afraid to.

He looked at her, sitting down too. "How'd you do it? How bad is it?"

"I tripped in the dark and hit my head against the wall. It's not so bad. I mean, it bled a lot, but…"

"Let me see it." He said gently. She turned away from him and leaned forward, and she felt his careful fingers part her hair. Kate turned back to face him, and tried not to be fazed by his grave expression.

"How are you feeling?"

"Dizzy. Sick. You're kind of blurry." She told him honestly. "But I'm _okay._"

"So, you just tripped and hit your head, and now you have a concussion? What exactly did you trip on?" Jack said incredulously. He wasn't buying it. Of course he wasn't buying it. He knew every expression, emotion, and opinion of hers before she opened her mouth. She hated lying to Jack.

"Yes, Jack. It was an _accident_." She stressed the last word and gave him a pleading look. He gazed back at her, and she could tell he understood she couldn't tell him what had happened. But he still wouldn't let the subject go.

"Have you been to the prison doctor?"

"No. I'm fine. Let's talk about something else. We only have a little while. Please?" She begged, looking at the clock behind him, which revealed that they only had an hour and forty-five minutes left.

He stared intently at her. His serious eyes looked tired and sad. _He_ _may be able to go where he wants and have a normal life, _Kate reflected, _but he misses me as much as I miss him_. She had to remember that she wasn't the only one in pain. Sometimes she was so selfish, it disgusted herself.

"Yeah, Kate. We'll drop it. Just promise me you'll tell someone if it gets worse, okay? You are… talking to people, right?"

Kate nodded, glad that he understood. Jack always understood.

Just as Kate leaned forward to have a real conversation with Jack, they both heard someone yelling with pure hate in her voice.

"Where is he? WHERE IS HE? Mira, I have rights to see Ben! You bitch!"

Their heads, along with all the others in the visitor's hall, swiveled around to watch the scene at the end of the hall. Kate recognized the woman screaming immediately… it was Laura. She was trying to lunge at a prim-looking woman in her sixties. The woman, Mira, glared back at Laura without any fear or sympathy. Her haughty face was turned up at Laura making a scene out of herself, as if she was disdained at such ainnappropriately behavedperson.

Kate was sure Laura would have managed to leap over the table had three guards grabbed her and started dragging away. As she was pulled from the room, Laura's face clearly showed her emotions: boiling anger, hatred, and most prominent, deep anguish. Kate could barely recognize her normally sarcastic, but always composed roommate. Her eyes were burning holes in everyone she had eye contact, and she threw her head back wildly as she yelled incoherent insults.

It shook Kate to see Laura this way, because though she'd only really known her for a week now, she hadn't expected ever to see Laura without the calm coolness she'd seen her with this past week. She felt like going after her. Laura had been so kind to her last night, she felt she owed her roommate the comfort she had just been given.

"That's my roommate. One of them." Kate said, horrified, to Jack. She actually stood up to follow, but then sat down again decisively. The guards would never let her go to Laura. She bit her lip worriedly. "All three of us have gone crazy within two weeks. Right in a row." She stated wonderingly. She leaned her elbows on the table and cupped her hands around her chin, feeling helpless. When didn't she feel helpless these days?

Jack grabbed her hand instinctively and squeezed it so tightly it hurt. "I'm getting you out of here. I got you a really reputable lawyer."

"You got me a lawyer?" Kate repeated, surprised and gratified.

He nodded, smiling. "Name's Sandra Hilliard, have you heard of her?"

And he began to wash her fears away.


	9. Social Anxiety

**A/N - SURPRISE! How's that for a plot twist? I haven't died OR abandoned the fic. I truly apologize for the ridiculous wait on chapter 9. But I promise, I PROMISE you, no matter how long it takes, I will complete this fic. And, just so you know, there will be a sequel to this, and I was going to start it right after I finished this one. But I've reconsidered, and I'm going to wait until the summer to start posting it, when I'll have more time to update. So, if you all can try to forgive this not-so-punctual kid, here is chapter 9.**

Kate was led back to her cell with the selfish, plesantidea of a completely empty room. No guards, no roommates. Quiet, where she could begin to absorb the thought of a trial without feeling sick. Maybe.

But when she was roughly shoved into the cell, Laura was sitting on Morgan's bed. She didn't look angry or mournful. She had her legs crossed and her clear, dry eyes stared out in front of her. Her bright yellow hair was somehow still perfectly in order, every strand in its place. Kate would have thought everything was fine except for the fact that Laura was violently shivering from head to foot. Her hands were tightly clenched in her lap, knuckles white and fists shaking.

Kate sat down opposite to her on her own bed, not knowing what to say. She tried for the obvious first question. "Are you okay?"

She wasn't sure Laura had even heard her for a moment; her eyes didn't flicker away and her lips didn't move. Then Laura said in a perfectly normal voice, "They didn't put me in solitary because I didn't fight the guards. They just told me what a bad girl I was and put me in my little time-out." She laughed mirthlessly. "That bitch wouldn't bring Ben with her. She just stood there, looking at me like I was scum. I know she thinks I am, but… she doesn't even know me." She took a shaky breath, and slowly looked up at Kate, her expression composed and calm. "Well, don't shoot the messenger, right? Even if the messenger is one of the biggest assholes you've ever met. I don't blame her... that much."

Kate shuddered. There was something eerie about Laura right now. It was as if she was passively narrating the story of someone else; her voice so emotionless. "I don't understand. Who's Ben? Why couldn't he come himself?"

"It's hard to cross a city and visit your mother in prison when you're five years old." Laura said. "Ben's my son." She said unnecessarily. "That bitch you saw me having a tantrum in front of is his nanny. They live with my ex-husband, and Ben's supposed to visit every week. _Every week._ And she said some shit about a contract being invalid…" Laura shook even more. "Liars, they're both liars." Slowly, she curled up on the bed like a child. "Ben loves me the best." She whispered pitifully.

"You could get a lawyer and straighten it out, I bet. If you know you're right about whatever contract they're talking about…"

Laura laughed again. Her voice changed into a hiss that made Kate cringe. "Oh, Kate. I don't have any _money. _I don't have enough in the bank to buy a hot dog. Not everyone has _Jack Shepherd,_ the little _angel _here to fix all your screw-ups. Don't kid yourself." She sat up and leaned forward menacingly. "And someday he'll be gone and you'll finally get what's coming to you."

* * *

Jack had just come home from eight hours in surgery, and he was exhausted. He'd saved the kid on the table out of sheer luck, but he saved her nonetheless. Now he was looking forward to some actual rest. He unlocked the door to his apartment. He was hungry, but had no energy to make something, so he collapsed on the sofa and fell asleep before he even knew he had closed his eyes. 

He didn't know how long it had been when there was a loud rapping noise, and he was jerked awake. In his jumbled, sleepy mind, he wondered if he was being robbed. Then he realized that it was probably still mid-afternoon and broad daylight out. Also, not many robbers knock before they enter. Fighting the achy feeling all over his body, he got up and answered the door.

Claire stood in the hall. He was surprised to see her – it had been over a week since she had stormed out, and he had not heard from her or Charlie since then. She looked embarrassed and upset.

"Hey Claire." He rubbed his eyes, trying to keep them open.

"Jack. Were you sleeping? Did I wake you up? I can come back later." She hurriedly turned to go before he could say a word.

"No, no! Claire, it's okay. I should have talked to you a long time before now." He gestured for her to come in, and she hesitated.

"I should have called. I don't know why I didn't call." She muttered as she stepped in.

They both sat down, and Jack tried to excuse himself for the mess of the place. He'd literally tossed his briefcase and coat on the floor when he'd gotten home from the hospital. There were still breakfast dishes on the table. The blinds were closed.

"You've seen the pigsty I live in, Jack." Claire said, trying to smile at him.

There was a moment of awkward silence. Jack looked down at the carpet. "Um, so, the last time we talked I was really irrational. It's just been difficult-"

"Don't defend yourself." Claire interrupted, her normally cool and collected voice harsh. At first Jack thought she would start screaming at him, but then she continued. "You didn't _do_ anything that you need to defend. I was so selfish and… and… ridiculous. I don't know why I thought I could compare Charlie and Kate, when their situations are so _unbelieveably _different. I'm paranoid of being left alone, and it makes me think so thoughtlessly." She took a deep breath, her serious eyes boring holes into Jack's. "The reason why I didn't call you before to make amends is because I was embarrassed that I acted like an animal."

Jack smiled sincerely. "Likewise." He said simply. Then he laughed. "I don't think I've been in a fight like ours since I was ten."

Claire grinned. "We're absolute children."

Suddenly the air was easy between them again, as if it had never been tense and uncomfortable. Both of them declared that they were starving, but couldn't bear the thought of cooking. They decided on Chinese takeout.

The apartment, which had been dreary just a half hour ago was now bright and cheerful. Jack and Claire sat in front of the TV with heaping plates of noodles, talking and reminiscing as the moon outside the window rose in the sky.

"And the _look_ on Hurley's face," Claire gasped for breath in between giggles "when I found him with his smuggled potato chips! He was just sitting on a log in the middle of the jungle with this huge bag of Ruffles. He didn't say anything, and I didn't say anything. And then he just goes… 'Want some?'"

They laughed heartily. After a moment, a sad smile flitted across Claire's face. "You were happier then, weren't you" she asked softly.

Jack considered. "You know, it's weird, but yeah. Yeah, I was."

They looked at each other for a minute. How odd it felt to know you led a fuller life while you were stranded on an island; an island full of danger and things you never got to understand. An island where every person knew and even accepted that each day could be their last.

If he'd somehow managed to stay on the island with Kate, hide until the boat was gone – _don't be ridiculous_. He told himself, but he still couldn't help but wonder. Sure, they'd eventually be found, but how long would it have been? How many more weeks could he have been able to spend with her before she was carted off to prison?

Jack and Claire turned to the television in their silence. They watched the flashing pictures and advertisements, but not really taking them in. They sat side by side, absorbed in their own thoughts.

* * *

The next thing Jack knew, he was lying on his side, still on the couch. The TV was off, and through the skylight, he could see that it was day. Rain spattered against the window aggressively.

He sat up quickly, and ignoring the dizziness and the spots in front of his vision, leaned over to see the clock on his mantle. It read 8:30AM.

With a start, he remembered Claire. Had he just fallen asleep while she was there? He stood up with difficulty, his body still aching, and his head pounding terribly. He hoped she'd gotten home all right.

_Apparently she hadn't, _Jack observed as he entered the kitchen to see her sleeping form slumped over on the table. She was sitting in a chair, and her arms were folded across the table. Her forehead rested on her arms, and her hair covered her face.

Jack considered letting her sleep, but she looked uncomfortable. He gently placed a hand on her shoulder. "Claire?"

She stirred and sat up straight, looking confused for a moment, like she didn't know where she was. Then she turned and saw Jack. "Oh! You're awake! I'm so sorry I stayed over uninvited! It's just… well, you fell asleep, and I didn't want to wake you up, you looked so tired. So I tried to leave, but my car wouldn't start. I don't know what's wrong with it –"

Jack tried to laugh, but it hurt his head. "It's okay. The only thing I'm mad about is - why didn't you use my bed?"

"Well, I felt like I was intruding enough…you don't look so good, Jack." Claire said, interrupting herself concernedly.

Jack sat down wearily. "I feel like I have a hangover. Or the flu. Or both."

Claire smiled sympathetically. "I think you're exhausted. Last night, you slumped over like you were dead in the middle of 'Deal or No Deal'. I looked around to see if someone had stabbed you."

"Stupid show, anyway." Jack muttered, rubbing his forehead. "You want me to drive you home, and then I can get a tow truck to come later today?"

"I feel bad enough encroaching on you yesterday, but I don't really see any other way. The subway doesn't go as far as my house, and I can't ask Charlie to come pick me up because he and Aaron are at Liam's."

Jack tried not to grimace outwardly. The last thing he wanted to do was drive Claire home. He hadn't felt this sick in years.

As if reading his mind, Claire said, "But I'll drive on the way there, at least. You look like you're either going to vomit or have another narcoleptic episode on me."

They left the apartment and walked outside. Jack held an umbrella out for the both of them, and as the rain lashed against them, Claire pulled him close, shivering.

That was when a man wearing black clothing and a huge camera around his neck literally jumped out of a bush and started snapping pictures of them wildly.

Claire immediately started screaming at him. "Hey, stop it! You _idiot_, stop following me! Get the hell out of here!" She turned to Jack. "Unlock the door!" she shouted at him.

In a dazed sort of way, Jack fumbled for the right key, jammed it in the lock, and opened the door. They both threw themselves inside the car. Claire started the ignition and slammed the door shut. Jack could still see the man taking picture after picture as Claire determinedly sped out of the parking garage.

"Damn paparazzi!" she seethed, her shrill voice hurting his ears. "That same guy follows me every-freaking-where I go. Sorry for that!" she said more soothingly, glancing at him. "You look like hell." She added.

"Thanks." Jack said, trying not to sound extremely irritated, leaning his head against the window. He needed a vacation.

* * *

Kate sat against the headboard of her bed. Morgan had been led back to the cell about an hour ago. Kate had been about to ask how she was, but before she was able to, received the nastiest glare she'd ever gotten. Laura hadn't said a word to her since her chilling words of a few hours ago. Instead she'd fallen asleep in a ball on her bed.

Kate was starting to think solitary wasn't so bad and had even made a mental list of things she could do to land herself there. She didn't come to prison expecting a cheerful happy bunch of felons, but _God._ She was living in a cell of nutcases.

Just then, Laura sat up, yawning. "I feel like shit." She announced loudly. "Those bastard guards gave me some screwed up tranquilizer, you know that? Like I was a rabid dog!" She laughed harshly.

Morgan didn't acknowledge her, just continued reading her tabloid at the table. But apparently, she turned the page too forcefully, because there was a huge ripping noise, and the page was in her hand. She crumpled it up and threw angrily it through the cell bars. It landed at a guard's feet, and Morgan looked daggers at him.


	10. Lightening Storm

**A/N - Okay, it'll be a miracle if anyone reads this any more. To anyone who actually is, thank you so much. I can't believe it's been this long since I've updated, and it's really depressing that I have this little time to write. Also, I know this chapter is on the short side, but the next chapter is the last one until I decide if I should write the sequel that I have in my mind, and I promise to post it soon and make it long.

* * *

**

When Kate woke up, she immediately knew it was not a normal day, but it took her several moments to collect her jumbled thoughts. Swimming to the surface of daylight, she blearily sat up and rubbed her eyes. Something was wrong. As if trying to hang on to a fuzzy dream that slipped away with consciousness, she attempted to remember what was so awful about today.

And then she did. It was the first day of her trial.

Kate stood up, wobbling a bit from unused muscles, crossed to the other side of the room, doubled over, and threw up into the toilet.

"_Jesus_ Christ!" she heard Morgan exclaim irritably.

Kate wiped her mouth and sank to the concrete floor. Not today. She couldn't do it. She couldn't face all those people who had already condemned her in their minds. Kate was supposed to be the victim in the trial, the tragic hero who protected herself, and more importantly, saved her mother from a sadistic, cruel father. But she knew that they all saw her as a murderer who ruined lives everywhere she turned. Maybe she was.

There was a time in her life that she was convinced that she was a cruel murderer; something had to be missing from her which made her this way, to be able to have killed her own father. Even though he was a bastard. Now that Jack was in her life, she wasn't so sure. How could someone so _good_ love her if she was as awful a person as she had always thought? Now Kate's view of her own self was muddled and confused.

Was she remorseful? Yes. She felt guilty that her mother had felt such grief, and that she had left her all alone when she rode off on her motorcycle. Needless to say, she hated herself every time she thought about Tom. But did she feel badly about Wayne?

No. He deserved more pain and suffering that he ever got. He was not her father, not really. He wasn't even a real person in her eyes; just some monster that ruined everything.

If even Kate felt these things about herself, she couldn't imagine what the jury would surmise about her.

She took a deep, shaky breath and leaned her head on her knees. She was shaking so badly that she tried to clasp her hands around her legs and found that she couldn't – in her panic, it was almost as if her body was going numb. _I can't do this. I can't do this. _The unbidden words echoed around in her head so loudly, it was as if someone was shouting them into her ear.

She heard the sound of metal on metal that meant that the heavy barred cell door was being opened. For one crazy, bewildered moment, she thought it was Jack at the door, but of course it wasn't. A particularly emotionless guard glared down at her.

"Kate Austin?"

She nodded, wishing the waves of nausea would go away; wishing everything would just go away.

"Are you ready to go?"

She answered by turning and retching into the toilet again.

"Five minutes." Was all he said, and he spun around and closed the door again.

"Kate?" Laura was suddenly in front of her, kneeling down on the concrete floor, looking pale and determined.

Kate waited for the hollow words that were supposed to comfort her, to bring her strength and a sense of courage. She waited to be told that everything would be okay, and that she could survive this. But Laura shivered and opened her mouth, speaking in a hoarse, pained voice.

"I probably won't see my son for another thirty years. You wanna know why? I killed his father. Not my ex-husband, some other guy. I killed him on purpose, because he wanted money I didn't have. The only way to make him shut up was to kill him, so I shot him in his sleep. I didn't really know him. I didn't hate him. He never really did anything to piss me off. Now, you killed your dad for a reason. And you're sorry, aren't you?"

Kate stared at Laura with wide eyes.

"Aren't you?" Laura repeated with a deep intensity.

And that moment, in the jail cell, on the floor, with a shattered life and a tired spirit, she was. Kate nodded slowly.

"Well, there you go." Laura choked. "Good luck, Kate."

And the guard opened the door, and Kate was lifted to her feet and pulled out of the cell.

* * *

Jack stood in the hospital, scrubbing up for the surgery of a six year old girl who had fallen out of a four story window. His mind was unfocused and flighty. He could only continue to check his watch and wonder what Kate was doing. Was she okay? Of course not, he told himself. She must be a wreck.

9:33 AM. The trial was scheduled to begin in twenty seven minutes, and so, coincidentally, was the surgery. Jack absently put on his cap and gloves, staring blankly at the wall.

"Are you all right, Dr. Shepard?" one of the nurses asked concernedly.

And it was then that Jack knew he couldn't perform surgery. He couldn't do it today. He felt like curling up in a ball and sleeping for weeks. He felt hopeless. There was no way he could focus on his job when he knew Kate was in a courthouse, with people vying for her freedom or for her redemption.

This could not possibly turn out fine in the end. Kate would be sentenced to years in prison, and there was no doubt in his mind that she would not make it out alive. She was a ghost of who she was on the island; bright, smart, adventurous. Every day, there was something to fight for. Now, she would waste away.

"Dr. Shepard?"

He looked down at his hands. They were shaking like they never had before in his life.

He held them up to show the doctors and nurses in the room, as if they needed proof that he was inadequate. "I need to go home." He said matter-of-factly.

They looked at his trembling hands, his ashen, grieving face, and heard the ache in his voice and knew that he did.

He pulled his scrubs off, laying them carefully on a bench. He took one look at the others, and left the room. No apology or explanation. There was no need anyways – everyone knew that today was the first day that Kate Austin was going to be condemned.

* * *

Kate was brought out of the car in handcuffs. Pulled up and pushed from behind, she walked with leaden feet up the stone steps.

Jack nearly got in two different car accidents on the way home. He drove automatically, not even looking at the road, not even flinching when furious drivers honked their horns or flipped him off.

Reporters were all around, snapping picture after picture, blinding her and screaming questions she didn't know the answers to.

He parked haphazardly in a lot behind a building that he knew well. He tripped up the steps in a hurry to get inside.

She tripped up the steps in a hurry to get inside. Someone jumped in front of her, a camera blocking their face. She put her hands up on front of her face to shield herself from the bright, painful flash.

He knocked on the door, and Charlie opened it. He looked surprised to see Jack, and stood there for a moment before ushering him in and closing the door.

Kate was brought inside, escorted down a long, dark hall and into an enormous room with mahogany and noise and expectant faces that openly stared at her as she entered.

Jack stood in the entrance of Charlie and Claire's house. He was searching for something to say and knew that Charlie was waiting. He finally admitted, "I… I can't last this day alone."

Kate managed to look up at all of these people, and scan their faces. Their expressions were curious, if anything. None of them were glaring at her, which was relieving, and yet no one was looking at her with sympathy either. She saw their dispassion and wished more than anything in the world that Jack was there. I can't do this, she thought, I can't last this day alone.


	11. The Light

**Like** any other hall in the prison,it was dimly lit and dirty, its floors reflecting yellowy light that illuminated two people's faces. These two people were vastly different – one was a man, the other a woman. The man, tall and burlesque, wore a tan uniform shirt with jeans with a thick black belt. A gun in its holster hung by his side. There was a serious expression on his face.

The woman was younger, smaller. She too wore a uniform, but it was navy blue. Her face was unreadable; it was difficult to discern whether she was surprised, nervous, or pleased. Her eyebrows were arched, her face was pale, and her lips were pressed together. She walked in front of the man, but she did not know in which directions to go. The man told her in a soft grumble whether to take lefts or rights as he opened gates with the touch of a few buttons.

The woman was Katherine Austen, and today she was being released from prison after three months awaiting a trial and a six month sentence.

**Kate** felt sick with anticipation. Her emotions were so jumbled that it was hard to understand herself how exactly she was dealing with the news that in a few more turns, a couple more gates, she would be outside. She would be standing in a parking lot without handcuffs, and Jack would be there, grinning. She would run to him, and he would lift her up and spin her around like in those old war movies when the soldier sees his fiancée for the first time in months. Kate smiled slightly at the thought.

Then the final door opened, and she saw sunlight.

**

* * *

Jack stood, feeling awkward, in front of his car, half-sitting on the hood. So this was it. Any second she would come out of that door and for the first time since he said goodbye to her in the hospital all those months ago, she would be standing in front of him, with nothing – not a table, not glass – between them. For the millionth time, he wondered what it would be like now that she was free.**

Not like the island, he knew not to be so foolish and ever think that. On the island, she was as free as she'd ever been – as a child, she was trapped in an abusive family and as an adult, she was on the run. Only during the ten months they spent there was Kate ever truly free. And jail will have changed her more than anything, Jack reminded himself.

And then the door opened, and he saw her.

**

* * *

She ran to him, just like she foresaw it. His face broke out in complete happiness the moment he saw her, just like she knew it would. But he didn't spin her around, and she didn't laugh and smile and giggle. She managed to throw her arms around his neck before her knees buckled and she collapsed against his chest, sobbing.**

Jack wrapped his arms around her, literally holding her up from falling to the concrete. Kate felt his strong hands around her waist and his chin rest lightly on the top of her head. She felt her legs lose their feeling as she tried to stand on her own. She heard herself cry and gulp and sniffle uncontrollably. She tried to stop.

After two minutes, she was able to gasp, "I don't know what's wrong with me." She stood on wobbly feet. She wiped at her face, trying to dry it, but found that tears would not stop dripping out of her eyes. "I don't know what's wrong with me."

She looked up at Jack. He had a sad smile, and he raised his hands and placed the on either side of her face. She realized that they were shaking.

"_Nothing_," he said gravely, "is wrong with you."

**

* * *

They drove with the windows and the sunroof down; cool autumn wind brushed their faces. Kate sat with hands folded. Her head was leaning slightly out the window, reminding Jack, with a touch of hilarity, of a dog. He could not help but continue to make quick glances at her as he drove, afraid that if he kept his eyes on the road for too long, she'd disappear. She hadn't spoken since she got into the car and that was okay. He would wait.**

As if she'd heard his thoughts, she spoke, ducking her head completely into the car as she did so. "Hey, Jack?"

"Yeah?"

"Um… could you pull over for a sec?"

He couldn't read her face; he never could. He didn't have a clue as to why she wanted to stop, but the next opportunity he had, he pulled to the side of the busy highway.

Kate turned to him. Her mouth was upturned and there was a sparkle in her eyes that he hadn't seen in almost a year. With a flash, she had leaned over and kissed him. Jack was so surprised for a moment that he didn't move. Then he eased into the kiss. She wrapped her arms around his neck again, but this time, it was with a soft, pleased motion. They smiled against each other.

* * *

"**So,** this is your apartment." Kate said unnecessarily, scanning the place. The living room, which was large and roomy, morphed into the kitchen, and she saw a hall that led, presumably to the bedroom. It was a lovely apartment, but she noticed how bare it was. There was nothing on the walls and there was little furniture. It lacked personality, and she knew it was only this way because Jack was oblivious.

"Yep. This is it." He threw his arms up in an exaggerated motion, as if performing on a stage. He watched Kate as she examined the counters, the couch, and the huge window that overlooked the busy street below. She was as thin as ever, he thought painfully, with protruding cheekbones and pale, sickly looking skin. She still wore her navy uniform and her hair was in a loose ponytail. Somehow, despite all of this, she looked beautiful. Perhaps she was more beautiful, because she weathered everything and still managed to be pretty.

Suddenly her piercing, alert eyes were on his.

"Why're you staring at me?" she asked, smiling slightly.

"I just… I can't believe…" He was at a loss for words.

"Me either!" She cried out suddenly, her smile turning to a beam. "I didn't remember what it was like to feel wind on my face, or kiss you! Well, I did, but... not really...Or even move around without being followed by government employees! Or..." Her jumbled words rushed out of her mouth.

"I'm quitting my job!" Jack interrupted loudly, before he even realized what he was saying. He stopped. He… was? He didn't even recognize that he had been miserable at the hospital for months – eve since he got back from the island. Now that Kate was here, in front of him, he knew he couldn't go back. "I'm quitting my job." He said again, as if to cement it. He exhaled excitedly.

"But you used to love being a surgeon." Kate said, confused.

Jack grinned like a boy. "I know!"

She laughed out loud, in relief. Here was her joy, her final feeling of liberation that she had been waiting for. She was home; this was home. She was suddenly pressed against him, her face upturned to his, and they were both releasing the laughter that they had been holding inside them, sounding ridiculous even to their own ears. They were suddenly in Jack's bedroom – no, her bedroom too, and they pulled down the shade and collapsed onto the bed.

**

* * *

Kate watched Jack from her place at the door. She had just finished rummaging through the cupboards and the refrigerator to find practically nothing in them. Her stomach rumbled, reminding her that the last time she'd managed to eat was yesterday morning. She couldn't remember the last time she was actually hungry.**

Jack was lying on his side, his eyes closed and the gentle rhythm of his chest moving up and down in breath. Her eyes filled up with tears. How could he have waited so long for her? How was it that he managed to love her? She still didn't understand.

"Jack?" she called in a whisper.

He stirred, and then sat up in a hurry. "I'm sorry," he said immediately. "I'm sorry. You should be the one who's exhausted. Are you tired?"

"I fell asleep too; I just woke up. And actually, I'm hungry."

He looked more pleased than he should at such a simple thing. She felt a twinge of guilt for causing him worry. After a moment's discussion, he decided that they were going to one of his favorite restaurants. He'd never been there except with coworkers, but it was really nice, he told her.

"Is it expensive?" Kate asked apprehensively.

"Yeah." Jack said happily. After she gave him a look, he was slightly mollified. "Okay, so neither of us have jobs. I'm a _surgeon_." (Kate smiled at the twinge of arrogance Jack held for his profession.) "I've got some money tucked away that'll last us a while. Besides, what better reason for celebration do you need?"

So, after a quick stop to a women's store where Kate bought a pair of jeans, a t-shirt, and a hat so she wouldn't be noticed, they went to the fanciest place in all of Los Angeles.

Kate had never been somewhere so nice. Iowa wasn't the swankiest part of the United States. She tried not to ogle noticeably at the chandeliers and the embroidered tablecloths. There was even a lobby – a lobby for a restaurant! She hoped Jack didn't notice how amazed she was by an upscale restaurant.

In the corner of the lobby, there was a beautiful grand piano, all smooth and shining. Without an explanation or a well thought out decision, she crossed the room and sat down on the bench. It was soft, with a silk black cushion.

Jack followed her. "Kate?"

She ran her hands over the keys without playing any of them. Ivory keys, white and black, eighty-eight keys all in tune, she was sure.

"Kate, what are you…" But Jack stopped speaking as she closed her eyes with an almost plaintive expression, and played the first notes.

It was a waltz, Jack realized, though he didn't pretend to know much about music. It was a soft, flowing waltz that sounded complicated just to the ear. He watched her graceful hands hover over notes and complicated melodies. Her straight back was swaying slightly in time with the beat. Her eyes remained closed, and he knew instantly that this was a song that she knew by heart, and even though it had been several years, it was an easy feat.

He was reminded fleetingly of Sarah, who played the piano with the air of a practiced, disciplined student. It was nothing like this – Kate was playing without thinking, it was effortless and beautiful. It wasn't sharps and flats and scales, it was just music.

He wanted to wrap his arms around her and feel the life in her, feel the happiness that was finally being allowed to be experienced and show on her animated face. But he didn't dare interrupt her playing. He realized this was not ordinary.

Kate had been waiting for this music to begin for years.

**A/N – Well, folks, that was it! Should I write a sequel? Or let it be? Tell me!**

**The sequel should involve abumpy Jate relationship, as Kate is forced to deal with depression and the harshness from strangers and acquaintances who are appalled at her light sentence. Not everything will be perfect like she'd idealistically thought.**


End file.
